


Of a similar disposition

by Odsbodkins



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: M/M, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-02
Updated: 2014-11-02
Packaged: 2018-02-23 20:58:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2555438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Odsbodkins/pseuds/Odsbodkins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the mid-1960s, and James Montgomery Falsworth is talking about the Howling Commandos.</p>
<p>For a prompt on the SteveBucky fest which asked <a href="http://stevebucky-fest.dreamwidth.org/307.html?thread=728883#cmt728883">"What if all the Howling Commandos were gay?"</a></p>
            </blockquote>





	Of a similar disposition

“Are we recording? Good show. Well, to start with, I’m only talking to you because this is cleared at the highest level, and on the understanding that this is completely hush-hush—top-level security on the recordings and so on. Mainly because most of us are still working, and it’s still illegal; more’s the pity. One can sometimes forget that, because SHIELD isn’t quite like the outside world, but it wouldn’t do to have everyone knowing this, even though some of it is rather becoming ancient history. 

Best start from when I was captured by Hydra. We knew from the start that we’d been captured by an odd egg because we got sat down individually, and they didn’t ask us about troop movements or anything like that, but instead they grilled us on our medical history. Of course I just sat there, repeating the old name, rank, and serial. Then the chap talking to me told me that he could offer me better working conditions, better food, and so on, if I would tell them about my compatriots. So I gave him my steeliest glare; then name, rank, and serial again. Then they weighed us, took all sorts of measurements, and put us back into a big holding cage. 

After a while we were all sorted into smaller cages, each of them labelled. At the time I couldn’t read a word of German, but Gabe—Jones—translated for us later. Some of them were obvious: all their little racial categories; but then there were oddities, like the left-handers being singled out, or chaps with particularly large heads. Don’t ask me how they chose which cage when you fitted into more than one category. Of course, I didn’t need to know any German to understand the label on our cage—‘homosexuell’, and I thought, well, one of our lot is a bad egg and took up the Hydra chappie on his offer.

So, Jacques—Dernier—had been there longest, awfully tough chap. Jim—Morita, that is—and Gabe were there as well. Dum Dum—sorry, Dugan—arrived a few days after me, and Bucky—Barnes—a few days after that. The way that Hydra arranged it, you worked with the other chaps in your cage, and if one of you misbehaved, the whole cage of you shared the punishment. As for the chaps who had blabbed to Hydra about their comrades, they were in a separate cage to start with, no work, better rations. That lasted all of three days, then Hydra obviously had everything they wanted from them, and they were put to the most dangerous work; if they objected they were shot. Every time a new batch came in, there would be chaps who blabbed, and those chaps would be dead within a week. 

And, of course, they took people for experiments. Schmidt and Zola would come down, go straight to one of the cages, and pick someone. You know, the day they came to our cage, Bucky stood up in front of the five of us, and told them that as he was the senior officer, they had to take him over the rest of us. Do remember that no-one came back after they were taken, and we were the ones who took the bodies to the furnaces. We knew what they looked like. Mutilated. Burned. He knew what he was volunteering for. 

But thanks to the offices of the good Captain, we all made it out of there. And as soon as those cages were unlocked, by golly, we fought. All in our little groups, like little strike teams. 

Then back in London, the Captain asks us to go back into the fight, and naturally, we've all rather got a bone to pick with Schmidt, so we all say yes. The day after that, Colonel Phillips calls us into his office down in the bunker, then shuts the door behind us. The Captain and Bucky were there as well, along with Agent Carter. The Colonel says, and I remember his words exactly: ‘Captain, we've talked to every man who was in that Hydra prison camp, and not a single one can remember what the label said on the cage that your boyfriend and this here bunch of queers were in.’ And I was thinking, that's torn it, it's either a dishonourable discharge or front-line latrine digging for the rest of the war. But instead he tells us to keep our noses clean, don't do anything that could end up with us arrested or in the papers, and he'll look the other way. Warns us that it’s a dashed sight more difficult when the world is looking to Captain America to be everyone's golden boy.

And as for keeping our noses clean—well, Gabe was always faithful to his chap back home, and he would have been come what may, so that wasn't too hard for him. The Captain and Bucky were rather sweetly devoted to each other; the only trouble there was that Bucky could show the green-eyed monster when the ladies or the chaps showed an interest in Cap, but we got rather practiced in claiming that there was some emergency that only our Captain and our Sergeant could deal with, and escorting them somewhere rather more private. You know, looking back, I think they might have been putting it on. Knew that if they made it look like they were about to cause a scene, we’d whisk them away for some time together.

Dum Dum was the worst by far; strong taste for boys in lipstick who couldn't pass for ladies even in the blackout, and not very good at keeping it under his hat. But since he hasn't changed in the slightest, I'm sure you already knew that. Fortunately, while we were in London at least, I knew enough places that we could go that no-one would look twice at Dum Dum spending the evening with a drag queen on each knee. 

Discretion forbids going into detail, but I certainly didn't spend the last two years of the war lonely. None of us did. Well, Gabe had made his decision about fidelity, but the opportunity would have been there if he'd wanted it. Even Jim—although he caught a lot of flak for being a Jap day to day, when the lights went down, it seemed that chaps wanted a little exoticism in their life, if you catch my meaning. And there was lots of cachet to being a Howling Commando, very romantic, made me feel very dashing; I think it rather overinflated my ego, to be honest. But fame's star is fickle, and it wore off very quickly after VE Day, more's the pity.

I think we got away with it as well. Chaps who’d been in the Hydra camp with us seemed the grateful sort; doesn’t seem like any of them blabbed, and while we had a couple of close shaves, we were never caught doing anything scandalous. Our closest shave was in France; we’d been billeted in a lovely house with very nice beds, which most of us were making good use of. Then, out of the blue, General DeGaulle himself turns up and wants to talk to Jacques, who at that point was doing his bit for international interservice relations with a rather nice young man from the Royal Canadian Air Force. And Gabe, brilliantly, intercepts the General at the door and doesn’t make excuses, but instead launches into absolute raptures about how much he loves France, in perfect French of course, so DeGaulle doesn’t realise that he’s being stalled. All the good General saw was the rest of us arriving ever so slightly out of breath, but nothing suspicious. 

The Captain and Bucky put up an excellent front of being just good friends when they were out in public. But if you'd ever seen them together, when they knew they were surrounded by people they could trust, well. Not surprising in the slightest that our Captain didn't live long after losing him. Rather soppy, truth be told. You'd never have guessed it if you met either of them on his own, but together—if I was going to be polite, I'd say romantic, but actually just terribly, terribly soppy. All puppyish eyes and little touches. One learned to ignore it, to save one's teeth from rotting.

Well, I think that's everything. Or at least everything I'm happy to have on record; as I said, discretion forbids detail, but we were and are all rather comfortable with who we are, and it's only really the legality and the practicality of keeping working in the field we do that means all of this wasn't on record already. I suppose we might even have those Hydra types to thank for that; when you've had your preferences emblazoned on a large sign for several hundred other men to read, it does rather force you to embrace it. I do think as well that the Captain and Bucky would have been of the same mind, but—they're not around to make that decision. So as I've said, for that reason, and for the obvious legal ones, this is completely hush-hush. Top clearance level, and it's only because Director Carter gave me her personal assurance that this would remain at that level that I'm talking to you.

So thank you, errr, I'm terribly sorry, it must be age catching up with me, but I've quite forgotten your name—”

“Pierce, sir. Alexander Pierce. And I'm very grateful to you for talking to me.”

“Oh, not at all. So is this little project about the Howling Commandos your own idea, or some SHIELD high-up?”

“A little of both, sir—”

“Do stop calling me sir.”

“—I was assigned to this, but I’m genuinely interested in the Commandos. I think there's a lot we can use when we're thinking about managing our current operations.”


End file.
